UK bombs Syrian oilfield after MPs vote
SOME MPS INCLUDING LABOUR LEADER CORBYN SPEAK OUT AGAINST AIR STRIKES
Britain joined the US-led bombing campaign over Syria yesterday, hitting an oilfield held by Daesh militants just hours after a decisive parliamentary vote authorised air strikes.
Royal Air Force planes based in Cyprus carried out the “first offensive operation against Daesh terrorist targets inside Syria,” the defence ministry said in a statement. The strikes with Paveway guided bombs were carried out by four Tornado fighter jets and focused on targets in the Omar oilfield in eastern Syria, 48 kilometres from the Iraq border.
The field “represents over 10 per cent of their potential income from oil,” the ministry statement said, adding: “Initial analysis of the operation indicates that the strikes were successful”.
US President Barack Obama, French President Francois Hollande and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman welcomed Britain’s participation. Momentum to join the strikes grew after last month’s terror attack on Paris in which 130 people were killed and Hollande yesterday hailed a “new response to the call for European solidarity”.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian news agencies there should be a single coalition to improve the “effectiveness” of the air strikes.
Prime Minister David Cameron’s government was backed by 397 lawmakers with 223 opposing the bombing in a vote late on Wednesday after a sometimes raucous debate lasting more than 10 hours.
A wide range of MPs including main opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn spoke out against air strikes, condemning Cameron’s “ill thought-out rush to war” and saying his proposals “simply do not stack up”. But Labour’s own chief foreign affairs spokesman Hilary Benn delivered an impassioned speech in favour of bombing, illustrating deep divisions in the party.
In the end 66 of Labour’s 231 MPs voted in favour, including 11 members of Corbyn’s shadow cabinet.
Cameron also refused to apologise to opposition MPs for reportedly telling fellow Conservatives in a private meeting ahead of the vote that they should not side with “a bunch of terrorist sympathisers”.
“Tornados at dawn” read yesterday’s front-page headline on Britain’s top-selling paper, The Sun, while The Times ran with: “PM wins huge backing for war”.
Britain already has eight Tornado fighter jets plus drones involved in the US-led coalition striking Daesh targets in Iraq, operating out of RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus.
They will be joined by six Typhoon jets, which took off from RAF Lossiemouth in Scotland, and two more Tornado fighters, which took off from RAF Marham in southeast England.
Diplomatic push
But experts question how much Britain, which has been wary of joining foreign conflicts in recent years after unpopular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, would add to the campaign against Daesh in Syria.
“It will not make a big operational difference,” said Professor Malcolm Chalmers of military think tank the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI).
“It is important symbolically, useful operationally, but not transformative.”
Tim Eaton and Chris Phillips of foreign affairs think tank Chatham House accused ministers of “knee-jerk reactions ... not part of a well-considered long-term strategy to defeat and degrade IS [Daesh]”.
Cameron has pledged that Britain joining air strikes on Syria will be matched by a major diplomatic push to resolve the crisis.
The last Syria peace talks in Vienna held last month brought together 17 countries including Russia, the United States, Saudi Arabia and Iran.